100 sled dogs killed because business was slow

I Tweeted about this horrific story yesterday. The Associated Press has details today about the killing of 100 sled dogs after a Canadian tour operator’s bookings dropped sharply in the wake of the 2010 Winter Olympics. (Let me make clear that I generally don’t have a problem with dog sledding. This is just plain animal cruelty, and it’s sickening.)

About 100 sled dogs, some badly maimed and writhing in pain, were killed and dumped in a mass grave after bookings dropped sharply for a tour operator following the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Sled dogs pull tourists during a tour run by Outdoor Adventures in the Soo Valley north of Whistler, British Columbia, Canada, on Monday, Jan. 31, 2011. An organization that fights animal abuse is calling the slaughter of 100 sled dogs by an outdoor adventure company in British Columbia a bloodbath and police are investigating. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Darryl Dyck)

The gruesome event was described in documents awarding compensation to a worker who claimed post-traumatic stress disorder after having to shoot the dogs.

Marcie Moriarty, general manager of cruelty investigations for the B.C. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, said the incident left her sickened and called it an “absolutely criminal code offense.”

Both the B.C. SPCA and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are investigating the slaughter.

Moriarty said some of the dogs were shot in the head, but others clearly suffered and did not die instantly.

“There aren’t words to really describe some of the ways these dogs died,” said Moriarty. “I think what gets to me, too, is that every other dog watched. And just the sheer number of dogs.”

“We don’t put cows down like that. Slaughterhouses have very strict rules for how supposed culling takes place. This violated every one of them,” she said.